The Dream of a Ridiculous Man

The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, short story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, published in Russian in 1877 as “Son smeshnogo cheloveka.” It addresses questions about original sin, human perfectibility, and the striving toward an ideal society. The inability of the rationalist to provide answers to all of life’s questions is also touched on.

The unnamed narrator sees himself as he knows others do: a once merely ridiculous man who has deteriorated into madness. At one time, desperate to the point of suicide, he fell asleep and had a dream that he had killed himself, was buried and exhumed, and traveled to a planet that was a duplicate ... (100 of 212 words)